Here comes the Magic Age of computing

Published 6:30 am, Monday, February 8, 2010

You'd think it would be easy to say what is — and isn't — a computer, right? But because the nature of computing is changing as technology advances, what was once obvious is now harder to define.

During last week's episode of Technology Bytes, the KPFT radio show I co-host with five other geeks on Wednesday nights, we stumbled into a rousing debate over whether Apple's new iPad is a computer. The discussion expanded to include smart phones and other devices.

Co-host Terry “phliKtid” Leifeste suggested the iPad was not really a computer because you can't really choose what to run on it. You're stuck with the iPhone OS — you can't sub out the operating system or access the under-the-hood parts of the device. He argued that such devices are appliances.

I countered that the iPad and smart phones are computers, because they have all the components you'd expect — a CPU, memory, storage, graphics and audio subsystems. They accept input, process information and deliver output. They compute, therefore they're computers.

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I posed the question the next day to readers of my blog, which also provoked debate. You can read the discussion in the comments at www.chron.com/computerdebate, as well as find a link to that episode of the radio show.

And you can expect to see more debates like this in the future. The evolution of computing is headed in that direction, and the iPad is a road sign. Increasingly, you can expect to see mainstream computing becoming less, well, computery. That's not going to sit well with techie traditionalists, who like to be able to reach in and mess with things, while the great majority of computer owners just want the dang thing to work and aren't particularly interested in the how or why.

A new age

We are coming out of the age of computing that's akin to the early days of the automobile, where you had to hand-crank the engine just to get it started. That Windows PC or iMac you own might seem pretty cool, but it's primitive compared to what surely waits for us down the road.

In the next computing era, it won't really matter what's under the hood or where the computer is found. It might be in your hand, in your briefcase, sitting on your coffee table, embedded in your bedroom wall or the dashboard of your car.

I'll even give this next age a name: The Magic Age, inspired by a popular quote from science fiction visionary Arthur C. Clarke: “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

We've been through several ages already: the eras of Big Iron, when room-size computers roamed the Earth; the Personal Computer age, when computers shrank and became the primary tool for work; and the current one, the Internet Age, in which computers globally — and even in space — are talking to each other and allowing for unprecedented sharing of information.

A trade-off

You already can see the beginnings of the Magic Age. The iPad and smart phones are among the heralds. With such devices, you don't look under hood (unless you're willing to hack them, something only a handful of enthusiasts care to do), and there's really no need. Yes, you cede control, in exchange gaining simplicity and a friendlier experience.

The slew of tablets that showed up at this year's CES, the annual consumer electronics show, was another indicator of this trend, as are e-readers such as the Amazon Kindle, Barnes & Noble's Nook and Sony's Reader.

Why do I call it “magic”?

Look, the fact that my iPhone knows where I am, then shows me restaurants, coffee shops, gas stations and theaters in the vicinity, and then gives me turn-by-turn directions to get to any one of them, all within a few seconds … well, that's magic. If you told someone 50 years ago that such a thing would be possible, they'd have put you away for being crazy — or figured you were a writer for that weird new show The Twilight Zone.

The Magic Age of computing combines wireless connectivity to the Internet, fast and inexpensive hardware, and intuitive software that ties it all together and effectively shields you from the wires, nuts and bolts. While there remains a lot of clunky tech out there that's still frustrating and often more of a hassle than it's worth, take heart: In devices like Apple's iPad, you can see the future coming.